Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill

Debate between Lord Hope of Craighead and Lord Patel

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 21st February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hope of Craighead (CB)]

My Lords, it is perhaps worth mentioning Amendment 28 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Patel, which was covered by the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, because he directs our attention to a quite extraordinary provision. On page 3 of the Bill at line 40, we are asked to approve Clause 5(3), which allows regulations to be made amending, repealing or revoking,

“primary legislation … for the purpose of conferring functions on the Secretary of State or on any other person”.

That is extraordinarily wide. I can understand conferring powers on the Secretary of State but why “on any other person”, given that the subsection then adds “(including conferring a discretion)”? That really is the most extraordinarily broad provision, which should be looked at very carefully.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

I thank my Convenor, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, for bringing attention to my amendment. I will be briefer than brief because the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, not only introduced my amendment but spoke to it. My purpose in tabling Amendment 28 was to bring attention to exactly what the noble Lord and the noble and learned Lord have just said: it is an extraordinary power to take. I fear that it is this kind of power that led the Constitution Committee to suggest that the only way for Parliament to scrutinise the Bill subsequently might be to introduce such a draconian provision as a sunset clause; I say draconian because I am worried that it may have other implications. As I said on Monday, I worry that that will affect what the agreements in the future might do, particularly with the EU. But we will no doubt have another opportunity to discuss that.

Modern Slavery Bill

Debate between Lord Hope of Craighead and Lord Patel

Wednesday 3rd December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Patel (CB)]

I have added my name to the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Warner. Powerful arguments have already been presented as to why there is a need to make the role of the commissioner truly independent, and I strongly support that. The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, also referred to the evidence and the comments made by the Joint Committee in the scrutiny of the draft Bill. I further add that the role needs to be truly independent. When we come to discuss the functions, as we will on Monday, there will be several amendments, including mine, which we will no doubt debate at length. Those are important amendments. If we put the two groups of amendments together, it will make it even clearer why the role of the commissioner needs to be seen and defined as truly independent.

[Lord Hope of Craighead (CB)]

My Lords, I make a brief comment on this debate from my experience of setting up the Supreme Court. One of the concerns in moving the appellate jurisdiction from this House to the Supreme Court was the risk of its not establishing its independence from the Executive, which was of course never in doubt when the Appellate Committee sat in this House. One of the surprising struggles that we had to have at the beginning of the Supreme Court’s existence was in persuading officials in the Ministry of Justice that they did not really have any say over how the Supreme Court ran its affairs. It took some time to establish that point—and, in particular, that the chief executive, on whom the court depends for so much of its running, was to be answerable to the President of the court and not to the Lord Chancellor. Of course, that battle has been won and is now in the past, and the relationship is perfectly harmonious. But the fact that it took something like two or three years to establish that point was a lesson. It was not spelt out in every detail in the legislation that set up the Supreme Court, which was deliberately simple and easy to understand. I wish to stress that it is vital to get this sorted out at the very beginning, because opportunities for doing so later in legislation do not occur very often. I hope that the Minister will take that point into account as well as the others.